As a technology demo, the second beta of this free software that brings SideShow functionality to your Windows Mobile phone is a clear success. The software links relatively consistently across multiple connections and is surprisingly responsiveeven over Bluetooth. With some polish, the interface could be great.

The new class of Vista-only SideShow gizmos, which interact with your PC through a small LCD screen and an embedded processor, has excited tech enthusiasts for nearly a year. The only problem? They still ain't here. SideShow devices were prominent stars at CES in 2007, but only a handful of products have actually shipped. High price has been a serious obstacle for many manufacturers, with color screens and chipsets adding overhead to already expensive gizmos. When these cool devices do ship, they'll be out of the financial reach of many.

Fortunately, there's another route to the SideShow, using a gadget you're already carrying around with youyour Windows Mobile phone. Ikanos Consulting, a startup brimming with savvy mobile-software developers, has just released beta 2 of the Go Gadgets for Windows Mobile software package, which will bring full SideShow functionality to any Windows Mobile-based cell phone (such as the Samsung SCH-i760, Motorola's Q9m, and the HTC Touch, just to name a few. But it's not just new phones; the software should work on Windows Mobile 5 and 6, for both Pocket PC and Smartphone (or Professional and Standard in the new terminology). In other words, save yourself a few hundred bucks: If you've got a Windows Mobile device, you've already got a SideShow product. The best part: Ikanos plans to release the software, free, on January 8just in time for CES 2008.

SideShow is an obvious extension of your mobile phone's features. It's got the processing horsepower and color screen the new technology requires. And your smartphone already syncs with your PC, right? SideShow adds "glanceable" data to the synchronization mix, pulling information like the weather and stock quotes from the Internetand your photos, music, and videos from your local network. Better still, the technology lets you control the content on your PC, so you can create and play a musical playlist or change channels if you're watching TV in Windows Media Center. The app uses a client-server architecture: Go Gadgets Server software is installed on your computer, bridging the two devices and controlling which gadgets and content are piped over to the mobile element that you install on your cell phone.

To test out all this goodness, I installed beta 2 of the Go Gadgets for Windows Mobile on an AT&T Tilt, which I had synced with a PC running Windows Vista Enterprise. Like most desktop computers, mine lacked Bluetooth connectivity. So I added Bluetooth with a Jabra A320s dongle. The initial setup experience was a bit funky, since the software is in beta and Bluetooth can be a little tricky.

Once the Tilt was configured properly, I launched Go Gadgets from its menu, which brings up the main interfacea scroll bar, at bottom, to select among installed Gadgets and current media info, displayed at the top of the window. The scroll bar has a small, poorly rendered icon for each gadget you've installed. Let's just say that the interface leaves something to be desired. Ikanos is concentrating on smoothing out the PC-to-phone connection and adding features, not on making Go Gadgets look good. The connection worked consistently and relatively smoothly.

From my PC, I opened the SideShow control panel and selected which gadgets I wanted to run on my phone. Gadgets are single-purpose applications that lie at the heart of SideShow; if you're running Yahoo Widgets or the Sidebar in Microsoft Vista, you're familiar with the concept. They control media playback, feed you the weather, and so on. Development of these applets is apparently a snap; Sidebar gadgets are architecturally very similar to SideShow gadgets, and may eventually be one and the same (I guess the names are similar for a reason).

Windows comes with two gadgets: One controls Windows Media Player and the other controls Windows Mail. Both ran flawlessly on my Tilt. Install Microsoft Office and you'll get a third gadget, which pipes your Outlook calendar to your phone. The SideShow control panel (you probably already have it installed if you're running Vista) also links to Microsoft's Gadget Gallery, where you'll find a few RSS viewers, a Gmail app, a WeatherBug gadget, and others. I think with the introduction of a bunch of SideShow devices at this year's CES, we'll probably see a bunch of new gadgets tooand ideally a Windows Media Center gadget from Microsoft itself.

All the gadgets I installed worked pretty darn well. However, the super-important "content pages"which show the album art and file info in Windows Media Player, or calendar data in the Outlook 2007 Gadgetweren't implemented in the build I looked at, unfortunately. Calendar items wouldn't display, nor would the "currently playing song" file. When done right, gadgets on your Windows Mobile phone will be as beautifully rendered as they are in Microsoft's Sidebar. Right now, though, that's not the case.

Beside the rendering issue, there's one other gotcha: SideShow is only as useful as the gadgets that power it, and since there are basically no SideShow devices in consumer hands today, developers haven't been eager to create many gadgets. Can you blame them? Meanwhile, hardware manufacturers cite the absence of software as yet another reason not to release products. It's a chicken-and-egg problem. Sigh.

After all the polish is applied (in the next month, I hope), this app could be a hit. A freeand übergeeky coolway to extend the functionality of your expensive cell phone? Who wouldn't want that? Until that day, I'd call Go Gadgets for Windows Mobile a very promising demonstration. Interested in joining the beta program? Send an e-mail over to Ikanos Consulting at beta@ikanosconsulting.com.

Jeremy Kaplan is a former executive editor for PC Magazine and co-host of the Fastest Geek competition. He also served as Editor of GoodCleanTech.com.
Kaplan helped to determine overall editorial direction, managed staff, and shaped the...

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